My Change of Identity
by LittleBiscuit
Summary: JDA -- JD gets kidnapped by a man who mistakes him for Dr. Cox, blaming him for a little girl's death. Will his friends notice and rescue him in time?
1. Chapter 1

AN: Hey there, this is my first scrubs fanfiction. I only recently got into it and immediately watched all the episodes back to back, that was a fun week...heh.

Hope you enjoy.

_"The identity of one changes with how one percieves reality."_

_Vithu Jeyaloganathan_

Chapter 1

The snow fell silently and slowly down on the parking lot around me. I put Sasha's keys in my pocket and wiped my nose with the sleeve of my jacket as I looked up at Sacred Heart. A quiet sigh escaped my lips and I trod towards the entrance. There was something about snow that made the world such a silent and beautiful place, but as a doctor I knew better. Motor accidents and other snow related incidents occurred a lot during winter, especially when it was as slippery as today. Also, this morning the local weatherman on my tv has predicted very bad visibility late in the afternoon thanks to a coming snow storm. Yep, this was probably going to be a long day, not to mention I had a back to back shift.

When I entered I was greeted by a flurry of activity. It seemed to be twice as busy as normal as I saw nurses scrambling with charts from one corridor to the other. Everywhere were patients, old and new, waiting to be treated. Most of them probably had the common cold or the seasonal flu, but I knew every last one of them was going to be checked out and the clinic was running over time.

I made my way to my locker and began to remove my scarf and jacket and tossed them carelessly inside. I knew I was going to regret that later when I was going home, because everything would still be damp from the snow, but frankly I didn't have the patience to track down a coat hanger. I changed into scrubs, took my stethoscope and tried to rub some warmth into my bright red fingers as the familiar burn of pins and needles began taking control of them.

I began walking towards the nurses' station as my imagination took my for a ride into a land with instant-hand-unfreezers and Personal Weather Bubbles™. I looked hazily off to one side when my daydream was disturbed by none other than my mentor, Dr. Cox, though the man would never allow me to call him that, ever.

"Hmn, I'd need to buy a whole bunch of Hawaiian shirts…" I mumbled dreamily as I focused on Dr. Cox, not having caught whatever the man had said that had disturbed me out of my daydream.

The older doctor's eyebrow rose only slightly in reaction to the comment, but feeling unfamiliar in such high territory, it quickly scrambled back down safely into Dr. Cox's permanent angry glare. I noticed that my mentor's arms were folded and temporally wondered if today was ethnic girl names day or if it was time for celebrities.

"Well there, _Belle_, I'm glad you're enjoying elaborate tourists traps as much as the next guy, though I've never been a big fan of the whole Oh-God-My-Eyes-What-The-Hell-Are-Those-Colors-are…are-those-_flowers??_ Hawaiian-shirts, but it's no secret your fashion sense has never been the same after you were locked up in your mother's closet for 3 days when you were _five_. However, I still have to remind you you're a _doctor,_ Miss. Jasmine, how ever hard it is for me to believe and accept that…now, there's work to do!" With that, Dr. Cox dumped a whole pile of patient charts in my arms.

Ah. Disney Princesses.

"Well don't just stand there, Newbie, there's sick people out there! I swear, if you're gonna kill someone today…!" He glared one of his most intense glares I had seen in the last month or so, and I briefly wondered what had gotten Dr. Cox in such a bad mood. I also noticed with some annoyance that half the patients my mentor had dumped on me were actually Dr. Cox's. I smiled my trademark smile and opened my mouth to say something. However, taking another look when Dr. Cox's eyebrows twitched with annoyance at my smile, the I thought better and scampered off.

---

After JD had left, Carla, who had watched the whole interaction, made soft tsk-tsk noise. Cox glared at her. "What?"

"Be nice to Bambi." Carla warned, unfazed by the death glare.

Dr. Cox rolled his eyes, tapped his nose, licked his lips and fixed Carla with another stare.

"Jordon took the Porsche this morning unexpectedly and went to her mother's, so I had to take the bus, and by god am I cranky after being coughed on for half an hour only to arrive here and be coughed on in this hell hole. If that annoying excuse for a doctor manages to even look at me the wrong way today…._it's not going to be pretty." _After the short rant, Dr. Cox turned and stormed off.

Carla just shook her head and sighed quietly. She probably knew Dr. Cox better than anyone else in this place, and she knew he was just a big softie on the inside. However, she also knew his rants could get pretty harsh at times and she hoped JD didn't do anything to get himself into trouble today, because the fact of the matter was, JD was a very sensitive person. Whenever he felt miserable, Carla's motherly instincts just told her to smother the kid with care, something she knew annoyed Dr. Cox to no end.

---

"Frick!"

"Something wrong, Elliot?" I had noticed something was bothering her as soon as she had walked past me at the clinic nurses' station. I felt for her; I had clinic duty in only an hour or so, just like Elliot right now and a lot of other doctors. It was impossible to cope with the number of clinic patients on days like this.

"You better believe something's wrong! I've got a patient in the clinic who's refusing to leave unless he's going to be examined by his dear _Dr. Cox._" Elliot said, frustrated. My eyebrows shot up.

"You're kidding, right? Someone actually wants Dr. Cox?"

"Yeah, and he's refusing treatment by anyone else. But Dr. Cox is too stubborn to come down here himself. Frick him!" Elliot seemed really stressed out.

"Well, I'm sure he'll come around eventually." I said hesitantly, not sure of my own words. Dr. Cox seemed particularly …well, _Coxian_ today. I had already gotten a good ranting from him half an hour ago, when I had screwed up something completely minor. I couldn't even remember what it was. Anyway, it had set off the older doctor like no tomorrow and the rant had left me slightly more hurt than I cared to admit.

"I don't think so. Frick. Gotta go." Elliot said, as her pager went off, and stormed away, leaving a trail of 'fricks'.

I heaved a sigh. I just wished this day was over, I was spent. I hadn't really had a good night's rest last night.

---

I pricked the patient for a fourth time, only to get the IV in this time around. I sighed with relief, this was more a nurse's job anyway, but I had noticed it had come lose and wanted to redo it. It wasn't like me to not get it in one try, though. I smiled at the older lady apologetically. Suddenly, somewhere behind me someone started clapping and I froze.

"Well, _Bravo _there, Cinderella. For a moment there I thought you weren't gonna make it, but golly, if it isn't the little engine that could all over again."

I turned around with a sigh while Dr. Cox leaned over towards my patient.

"Be glad he didn't kill you, ma'am" The older doctor whispered conspiratorially at the frightened looking older lady. Then, as an afterthought he added: "…yet."

I rolled my eyes. "What do you want?"

Dr. Cox let out a laugh.

"I…want something of you? Never. I'm just checking you don't screw up while I'm not looking, because, _see_, I'm still responsible for anything you do. But it seems you'll screw up even when I _am_ looking."

With that short and majorly unprofessional little rant, Dr. Cox left the room and I turned back towards my patient. I gave her another apologetic smile.

"He's kidding."

The lady just stared at me.

--

"Where's Miss Carmen's chart?" I asked as I approached the nurses' station. Carla gave me her I'm-sorry face and my heart sank.

"I'm sorry, Bambi, she switched off your service." Carla said, with a slight frown. I let out of breathe of annoyance. I was sure Dr. Cox was just venting his frustration, but this was just getting out of hand. This was the second patient that had switched off my service this morning.

"This is getting ridiculous, I'm going to talk to Dr. Cox." Carla said, with a huff of indignation when she saw my expression. But, noticeably to her surprise, I shook my head.

"No, Carla, that's all right. I'm sure he'll come around." I said uncertainly, echoing my words earlier with Elliot. Then, when seeing Carla's doubtful face, I added with a slight smile; "I was swamped anyway."

"Ok…" Carla said carefully, giving me a quick pat on my head. "Take care, Bambi."

I took one of my other patient's chart and looked at the clock. It was past lunch time already and I hadn't even seen Turk today. However, I wasn't feeling particularly hungry, although I slightly regretted skipping lunch break.

---

"What about Mrs. Harris?"

"Blood tests showed Hepatitis B, I think she's going clear it herself so I'm not going to start her on adefovir."

"And Mr. Moore?"

"I started him on a broad spectrum of antibiotics, took a few blood cultures and performed a Lumbar puncture to rule out meningitis."

Dr. Cox grunted and inhaled through his teeth, making a slight whistling noise. Nobody had died yet and newbie didn't appear to be screwing up, but that last part almost annoyed him. He had been looking forward to yelling at him again for something insignificant, although he had seen the hurt look on the man's face from the rant this morning. He had to admit he was being particularly hard on the kid today.

He took in newbie's appearance. The younger doctor was giving out as much smiles as usual, but he didn't appear to go through any lengths to be as particularly annoying as normal. In fact, now he thought about it, newbie wasn't even nearly as hyper, and when he looked closer a general tiredness seemed to be present in the man's posture, and there were slight black rings noticeable under his eyes.

As if on cue the younger doctor looked up slightly bleary eyed at his mentor. Dr. Cox looked at the clock, noticing that it was past lunch time, and he couldn't remember JD even going downstairs to grab something to eat.

"You. Take a break before you forget to concentrate and kill someone." He snapped, glaring at the younger doctor. JD looked confused with this sudden act of kindness, but then a wave of defiance passed over the younger doctor's face.

"I'm fine, Dr. Cox."

"It wasn't a suggestion."

"Sorry, but I can't. I've got clinic duty in less than five minutes. I'm just here to drop off these charts and go downstairs." JD said, with…was that really a annoyed expression? Dr. Cox frowned.

"Are you telling me off, Newbie?"

JD shrugged, thought better of it and looked up. "I think you should go downstairs and see that patient Elliot's been…talking… about…" He said, trailing off at the end of the sentence, leaving the convincing power behind the statement to trail off as well as he quickly looked down at his charts.

"Look here, _Alice_, I'm too busy to go down to some random patient who probably only has the flu just because Barbie can't keep her own. If she just went ahead and looked at the man for two seconds she could sent him on his way with some Kleenex and some advice for bed rest. And there's the difference between her and me, " He leaned closer towards JD. "I'm a _good_ doctor."

He huffed and crossed his arms again. "Now be a good little lap dog and check up on these patients-" He tapped the small pile of charts on the Nurses' station bar surface. "after you're back from the clinic. If you say you're fine, then you can handle a few more cases. I'm off on _my_ break however, so don't you dare disturb me with anything other then…." He thought for a moment, looking off to the right and then said; "Scrap that, don't disturb me, period."

Dr. Cox turned and didn't even wait for a reply as he walked off.

---

My hands itched. I didn't know what it was, but Dr. Cox's antics really annoyed me today. I was already covering most of the older man's patients and I simply didn't think I should cover every last one of his patients just because he was having a bad day.

Who was I kidding, I knew I was going to do whatever the man told me to do. And with a last weary glance at the pile of charts, I shuffled towards the elevator. The clinic was waiting for me.

---

"Hello there… Mr. Campbell. "I looked up from my chart to the patient seated on the bed after I closed the door of the examination room behind me.

The man on the bed looked up at me. He had a scruffy beginnings of beard, probably only a few days old and he looked angry.

"Are you Dr. Cox? I want Dr. Cox, I've been waiting for over an hour!" The man demanded immediately.

"I…" Suddenly, I was struck with a thought. If after an hour this man was still here, and Elliot hadn't gotten rid of him, the man must be really determined. I also knew that Dr. Cox wouldn't be showing his face down here any time soon today. I looked down at myself, noticing that the chart I was carrying was conveniently obscuring the man's view of my name tag. Then I decided to do something that I thought would do everyone a favor.

"-Yes. Yes, I'm Dr. Cox. What seems to be the matter?" I said, pretending to write something down on the chart while quickly putting my name tag in my front pocket. As I looked up I saw different emotions flitter across the man's face, and I briefly wondered what the man's reasons were that he so desperately wanted to be treated by Dr. Cox.

The man seemed at a loss for words for a few seconds, clearly taking in my appearance. Then he suddenly coughed.

Ah. Probably the common cold after all.

"Nasty cough you got there, let me take a look." I said while I turned around and placed the chart on the table. I grabbed my stethoscope from around my neck and looked around at the patient…

…And at the handgun the man had now trained on me.

I froze.

---

Elliot spared a glance at examination room number 2. She had seen JD go in there, and remembered that weird patient from before was in there as well. She was sure he would have come out after less than ten seconds, remembering the patient's weird demand to see Dr. Cox.

But now she thought about it… She shot a quick glance at the clock, hmm… JD had been in there for a good 5 minutes already. Weird. Normally, the routine clinic check up were done in a few short minutes.

She shrugged, maybe he had found a way to examine the guy after all, without the help of Dr. Cox, but it had taken some time convincing him. She was glad JD had found a way to get the patient out of here though, because now it wasn't her problem anymore.

--

I looked as the man paced back and forth in front of the door, knowing that every minute we stayed here longer the chances of someone else coming into the room grew. I was now sitting at the examination table and luckily the gun wasn't trained on me anymore… for now.

"Maybe-" I began, but the man stopped abruptly.

"Shut up!"

I shut up.

The man muttered to himself and then looked up."You wouldn't remember me." The man said, angrily. "But you would certainly remember my brother, you bastard."

I didn't know what to say as I sat there, not taking my eyes off of the gun that the other man was waving around while he was mumbling. Clearly, Dr. Cox had done something to really piss this guy off.

I had briefly considered telling the guy I wasn't Dr. Cox after all, but thought better of it because I knew the man couldn't just let me go, after threatening me like this… and that only meant he was probably going to go after Dr. Cox anyway after the man had….disposed of me. I didn't want other people to get hurt.

"She believed you! She believed you, you know. You said she would be all better. They were so glad!" The man yelled at me, all kinds of emotions fleeing across his face. I shrunk back as the gun was yet again trained on me.

"She was gonna get better… But then, then she died. And it's your fault! You lied to us….You lied. They hadn't prepared themselves, but you said-" The guy's voice broke and he sat down with a huff. I refrained from saying anything as I watched silently with terror-filled fascination.

"He lost them both…Susan, oh god. ...Michelle cried for weeks, and then…then she went away..." He whispered and I had to strain my ears to catch that part at all.

Susan and Michelle.

The names stirred a memory in my head as I desperately tried to make sense of the situation. I remembered…. I remembered those names. I remembered the patient.

Ten year old girl. She had pneumonia. She was going to get better, she had been on oxygen for weeks but she was going to make a full recovery. Dr. Cox had told them. I had been standing next to him, right there!

It had been such a rare complication… Haemorrhagic cardiac tamponade. She had become unwell and her heart had failed. The diagnosis had come too late.

It had been a freak incident.

It had been months ago. But I remembered.

"I'm…I'm sorry." I croaked out, feeling painfully aware how hollow my apology sounded.

"Shut up!" The man said again, pointing the gun at me. He started pacing again, looking troubled, and I felt anxious.

Finally, after what seemed ages, the man looked up and looked at me. I swallowed.

"So, this is what you're going to do."

---

TBC

Reviewers get virtual cookies!


	2. Chapter 2

AN: Thans a lot for the reviews :) They make my day. Virtual cookies all around!

Now on with the story:

"_Panic plays no part in the training of a nurse."_

_Elizabeth Kenny_

Chapter 2

I closed the examination door behind him, my heart hammering in my ears. I cast a glance around the hallway, which was packed. There he was, standing near the exit. His right hand was in his front pocket and he looked at me, the warning evident in his eyes.

There was a mother and a kid sitting in front of him, right there.

My hands shook as I dropped them by my side. Not wanting to attract any unwanted attention, I looked down at my feet and made my way towards the exit.

"JD!"

Oh god, Elliot. I ignored my name.

"JD!"

Suddenly her hands were on me, stopping me from going any further. Finally I halted, my heart hammering so loudly I was surprised nobody else could hear it.

"Where are you going?" Elliot asked, confused. I gave her a pained expression as my gaze quickly fell on the gun man again. The man looked thunderous and gave a quick jerk with his right hand inside his pocket.

_If you try to talk to anyone, I'm going to start shooting people._

I swallowed.

_If you run I'm going to start shooting people._

"JD?" Elliot looked at me quizzically.

"I'm just going to get some air!" I finally answered, a lot louder than necessary so the man could actually hear what I was saying. I gave Elliot a look, though, trying to convey telepathically what I was thinking.

God, Elliot. There's a crazy man with a gun trying to kidnap me and if I don't go with him he's going to go and kill people. You have tell someone. Look at me! Do I look like I actually need some air? It's a lame excuse!

I mentally screamed at her.

Elliot looked at me, confused when she noticed that I didn't have a jacket. She probably also noticed I was sweating slightly, and that I was currently giving her one heck of a crazy stare.

"Oh…okay." She said, wondering what the hell had gotten into me. "You… you look like you could use some air."

I rolled my eyes safely inside the depths of my mind and then pushed past her quickly when I noticed the gun man stepping forward slightly.

I had to get out, now.

I got out of the exit and stepped outside. Immediately the icy wind, which had picked up speed during the day, whipped at my scrubs and attacked my face and ears with stabs of coldness. When I noticed the man had gotten out of the hospital behind me, I slowly headed up the snowy parking lot, shivering uncontrollably as the snow got into my sneakers, soaking my socks.

The man walked closer now and nodded for me to keep walking. After passing several cars, suddenly the man grabbed my arm and opened the door of a black Toyota.

"Get in!"

I half fell, half crawled inside the back of the car. Although the situation was to bizarre and terrifying to even begin to assess, I felt strangely calm now. It seemed as though with the adrenaline from earlier, some sort of emotion sedative was coursing through my body and I couldn't allow myself the time to think about the situation and panic.

Frankly, I was just glad we had gotten out of there without anyone getting hurt.

"Where are we-" I began, but before I could finish the sentence, the man whipped around and hit me in the face with the back of his gun, making me fall back onto my side. Pain exploded inside my head like fireworks, and I gasped for air, surprised I didn't just black out. When the world swam back into focus I gingerly reached up towards my temple and hissed when I touched the sore spot. Nausea swept over me in waves.

"No talking!" The man demanded, and I was back to looking up into the barrel of the gun. I slowly nodded to show I understood, although I immediately regretted the action when another bout of dizziness and pain made my outlook on today go even more bleak and pessimistic.

--

"Where the hell is Martha?" Dr. Cox asked no one in particular, clearly switching away from Disney names because he decided he didn't want to give anyone the idea he actually watched any of the movies. He glanced at the pile of untouched patient charts, and also noticed Carla was busy with something else and wasn't paying him any attention. He whistled sharply. Carla's head shot up and she glared at him.

"If you are going to use that whistle one more time on me, Dr. Cox, I'm going to start ignoring you all together. I'm not a puppy." She said, one hand on her hips.

Dr. Cox shrugged non-committedly.

"Where's Newbie?"

Carla frowned slightly.

"I don't know, I haven't seen him since he went downstairs."

Dr. Cox glanced at the clock. He had made sure he had taken a long, nice break. He knew if anything was going to go wrong, he was going to get paged anyway. Since no one had, he had just watched a marathon of soaps on TV in the doctors lounge.

It was 4 o'clock. Newbie should have gotten back at least an hour ago.

"You mean to tell me he hasn't been taking care of his patients, _at all?"_ Dr. Cox asked, angrily. Carla shot him a look that clearly said something about what she thought about his own commitment to his patients.

"_Oh,_ I'm so going to love it when I get my hands on him." Dr. Cox said through gritted teeth, ignoring the look. He took his pager from his belt and paged newbie.

--

We had stopped at a petrol station.

After departing from Sacred Heart, the security guard not even noticing me in the back seat, the man had taken so many turns I had quickly given up trying to figure out where we were going; I had been silently lying in the back seat, pretending to have blacked out from that second blow to the head I received in response of some sort of comment I had made about something or other. The general tiredness and after-adrenaline low might have caused me to really nod off for a bit, but after every bump I was awake and alert, my heart doing overtime and my head throbbing so much I felt like throwing up.

Taken this rare opportunity of not-hitting-me-in-the-head, the man had inserted a tape deck. It was probably to calm his own nerves, but it played some of the most godawful songs I ever had to listen to. I had tried to get some blood flowing in my hands and feet, which the man had securely tied with PlastiCuffs. The bastard.

Now the man gingerly opened the driver's door at the petro station. The harsh wind immediately got hold of it, pushing it open even further and causing snowflakes to be blown into the car. From my cramped and awkward position in the back I could briefly see some of the petrol station's banners, almost being torn from their positions by the cold stormy weather

Slushies half price. Super Saturday Special. Collectible points for more gas.

This was all awfully familiar. I knew those banners. I knew this petrol station.

If I knew the petrol station I knew on which highway we were.

I guess that was at least something, although it did little to console me.

The petrol station was fully automated, so any change of attracting attention from other drivers when the man needed to go and pay was out of the question. Damnit.

I briefly wondered if anyone at the hospital had noticed I had gone missing yet. Probably not. Some days I got the impression everybody was just annoyed by my presence, and today especially had left that idea in my head.

I sighed.

The door opened again when the man clambered back in the car, and I played 'dead'. The man briefly grunted when he noticed I was supposedly still out cold, and then started up the car again.

We only made it a few hundred meters before the man got off of the highway at a junction. I knew the highway well enough to know it was likely this was the first junction after the petrol station, though I had no idea where it led.

Soon enough the shaking and bouncing of the car told me though that it was probably some sort of long country road, making me extremely nauseous after a while. It seemed to go on for several miles and I was feeling extremely sorry for myself. Well, at least the tape had stopped playing.

My pager went off.

My eyes flew open in shock. I had totally forgotten about my pager. Not that I could have reached it from my awkward position now.

The man looked behind him in alarm, and seeing me awake immediately stopped the car and whirled around again, gun in hand. My hands shot up in self-protection.

"Please don't hit me!" I squeaked. God, Dr. Cox would have a field day ridiculing my girly behavior.

The man grabbed me at the front of my scrubs and hauled me in some sort of sitting position, making my head swim with the sudden movement.

"What the hell is that! I thought you didn't have a cell phone on you!" The man demanded, pressing his gun in my neck.

"I…I don't!" I blabbered in fear, my voice at least an octave higher as I felt the cold front of the gun pressing down hard on my bare skin, probably leaving some kind of bruise. It was true enough, I had left my cell phone in my locker.

"You liar!" The man raised his gun to hit me again.

"It's my pager!" I half-screamed, arms raised and face turned away as I waited for the gun to hit me again. However, instead I was grabbed forcefully again and I shrunk back from his touch as he searched for my pager. He found it soon enough.

"What the hell?" He said, examining the little black thing in his hands. He looked confused for a moment.

"Fucking useless." And with that little statement he lowered his window and threw it outside, soon leaving it behind us as he continued down the snowy country road.

I sat in complete silence, still shaking from the sudden activity.

At least now I could see where we were going. We seemed to be heading towards some kind of small forest along a small snowy road. On both sides of the car there were long fields of blinding white snow, which pierced my eyes and did nothing good for my throbbing head. There wasn't a house in sight and the highway was long behind us. The trees in the distance had all lost most of their leaves, but they were still packed together enough that, in combination with the snowy wind, you could see at most 10 meters or so into the woods.

I tried suppress the feeling deep down in my stomach that had been present ever since I first stepped into that examination room. If you learn one thing from med school, it's that blind panic really isn't good choice for your emotional state to be in.

But _terror. _Now terror was something different. It really seemed to _focus _you certain details.

I let terror run free for a while.

---

We had stopped in a small clearing in the forest. It had stopped snowing for now, and everything looked so white and crisp around us.

Why had we stopped here? There was nothing here.

For a very long time the man just sat there, staring ahead. His expression was hidden from me as I sat behind him, which made me extremely nervous.

Then, finally his hand turned the ignition keys and the engine was cut off. Silence settled over us and I almost dared not breathe, afraid to disturb it.

"He commit suicide you know." The man said matter-of-factly , his voice as cold as the air outside and I froze.

"He always was mother's favorite. Always better at everything, always two steps ahead." Then a laugh escaped him, sounding eerily out of place. I just stared at his silhouette against the white light from outside with some kind of fearful fascination.

"My little brother. He had a perfect family, perfect job... Unlike me. I always messed up, but he looked after me even though it was supposed to be the other way around. He looked after me after our parents died." His shoulders straightened as he looked up into the rearview mirror, catching my fearful eyes. I dared not look away.

"He looked after me after I got out of prison as well." His eyes bore into mine.

"He had a perfect fucking life. You took that away from him."

He opened the cardoor, slowly. Casting a look over his shoulder, I saw his expression.

"And you took him away from me."

_Why had we stopped here? There was nothing here._

There was nobody here.

Cold realization swept over me as the man stepped into the inch deep snow outside the car.

Oh god, was that knife in his hands?

The man opened the backseat car door and I scrambled to get out of his reach, finally letting at least some panic dictate my actions

"No!"

I struggled as he grabbed me by my feet and physically hauled me out of the backseat. I landed on the snow, hard. Immediately I tried to crawl away from his reach, but he was on top of me. He was twice my size, and much stronger.

I stopped moving as I felt my head being pulled back by my hair and the blade against my throat. I was pulled in some kind of standing position, the knife not moving an inch. He grinned in my ear, his soar breathe in my face as he hissed his words.

"They were innocent. But thanks to you screwing up your job, she died." The knife left my throat, and I let out the breath I had been holding, fearing I cut myself if I dared exhale.

"Innocent people die when you fuck up, but you don't fucking care, do you." The knife traveled across my chest. I was painfully aware of it going lower and lower, slowly finding its way towards my abdomen.

"Guilty as fucking charged." With a swift movement, the man cut my hand restraints and pushed me forward, making me fall into the snow. I barely had time to register the fact that he hadn't actually cut _me_ and that I had cushioned my fall with my now free hands, as fear had completely taken over my brain.

"I have no mercy with guilty people like you that don't even have the guts to do something about their faults. Hell, God knows I did some awful stuff, but I went to _prison_ for it. Never complained once." He rolled me over with his boot, kicking me in the side. I looked up at him towering over me, too terrified to move.

"I wanna see you acknowledge your error and then we'll see what your punishment will be, eh? I wanna see you beg before the end." The man grinned.

I suddenly knew that if I did as he said, that would be it. The end.

I had to stall.

"It wasn't me!"

"You fucking liar!"

"No! I'm…I'm not Dr. Cox!" He grabbed me again by my hair, my head swam with dizziness and I grabbed his arms from choking me. I was on my knees now.

"Admit what you did!"

I ignored him. "I'm Dr. Dorian! John Michael Dorian! I'm a-"

Blinding hot pain. I gasped in shock.

"Don't you fucking abuse someone's fucking innocent name!"

I fell silent, blinking away tears.

"My brother mentioned Dr. Dorian. Don't try to drag his good name through the mud of your errors, you bastard." His eyes were thunderous.

"So now you're going to admit what you did or the next cut is going to be a _little_ more harmful." He hissed in my ear.

Seconds passed. The knife was at my throat again, drawing a small thin line of blood.

The man's eyes narrowed. The knife twitched as he pulled it back slightly.

"Fine-"

Well hello there, _blind panic. _I missed you.

The man never got a change to finish his sentence as I took advantage of the little extra space to move my head forward and then head butted the man in his face with the back of my head. He let me go with a howl of anger. I fell to the ground, blinking away the throbbing pain. I felt like my head was going to split in two and a small moan escaped my lips.

I heard the string of muttered curses and saw through unfocused eyes as the man staggered backwards, blood spurting from his nose.

Then I noticed the small object on the ground.

The knife.

I lunged for it and felt a small twang of reassurance when my hand closed around it's handle. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the man stagger back towards the car, towards the gun.

No time.

As quickly as my trembling hands allowed it, I brought the knife back to my leg restraints, cutting them.

I was free!

I tried to get up unsteadily, my head swimming from all the blows it had received in the last hour. Then my vision cleared slightly. I scrambled into a standing position and ran for it. Ran like I'd never run before, skidding and sliding across the snowy ground, too afraid to look behind me. If I could only reach the trees…

A clear shot rang out, echoing through the wood.

TBC

A review a day, keeps writersblock at bay!


	3. Chapter 3

AN: Thanks for the reviews ! Keep them coming, they make my day and it's what keeps me writing. I'd really like it if you told me about what you think about my writing style, if you like the characters and If you think I could improve, but a simple: keep writing – comment will work its magic as well :)

And here's the next chapter, a little bit shorter than usual.

Enjoy.

"_Nature has no mercy at all. Nature says, "I'm going to snow. If you have on a bikini and no snowshoes, that's tough. I am going to snow anyway."_

_Maya Angelou_

Chapter 3

"So when's the last time anyone saw Isabelle?" He demanded, arms crossed and his face showing the signs of a badly disguised fury raging in his head.

"Isabelle?" Elliot asked, confused.

Dr. Cox raised an eyebrow.

"_Oh! _ I… I saw him at the clinic. He said he needed a breath of fresh air." She stammered.

"And when would this delightful little interaction have taken place?"

"Well, it was before I started my shift here, but after I got that slushie from the second floor sluhsie machi—"

"_Just_ the time, thank you, Barbie. I think if I hear another unnecessary word out of your mouth I might faint from the amount of Not Caring being transported through my system." Dr. Cox cut her off.

"Er, at least an hour ago. Maybe two."

Dr. Cox growled, making several interns shiver and scamper off in wild attempts at self-preservation.

---

"You coward! Come out!" The man yelled, searching the tree line with his frantic eyes, holding the gun loosely by his side.

He grunted and wiped his bloody nose with the back of his hand. "You think you can get far like that?" His words echoed through the clearing but seemed to dampen as soon as they reached the dense forest line.

"There's no one around for at least five miles!" He approached the tree line, looking down at the carnage on the ground. Below his boots the snow had turned from a brilliant white to a bright red.

The wind whipped at his jacket and he looked up at the cold, ominous grey sky, heralding a snow storm. He grinned.

He wouldn't get very far. The cold would take care of the rest.

He made to turn, but stopped when he noticed something from the corner of his eyes, seemingly out of place in the mess of snow and blood. He kneeled down and plucked the offending object off of the ground.

_Sacred Heart Hospital_

_John Dorian MD_

_Attending_

From the nametag, JD's face smiled up at him.

---

A long line of curses escaped my lips as I finally collapsed onto my knees, gasping for air. I sat there, dizziness claiming me and I looked up. Staring at the black branches of the spooky trees against a background of the grey and stormy sky. Pain shot up in waves, each one crashing over the other as they radiated through my arm and shoulder, demanding attention.

He fucking shot me.

I looked down again and saw the dark red blood, _my _blood, staining the clear white snow, monetarily captivating me in some kind of morbid fascination. I snapped back to reality and pulled away part of my shirt to look at the damage.

"Please. Please. Come on. Come on... Come on!" My feverish mantra helped my hand find a way to the bullet's exit wound, clearly big enough that I knew the bullet hadn't shattered, unlike my collar bone. I breathed a big sigh of relief but stopped immediately when pain shot again through my shoulder and arm at the unexpectant movement.

Aargh.

Even though there wasn't a bullet in there anymore, didn't mean the shards of bone couldn't pose a problem inside my body.

And it was so damn cold.

I didn't even have my jacket with me, I was still in my scrubs for god's sake.

The blood kept coming as I tore of a piece of my scrubs and tried to tie it around my shoulder, at least applying some moderate pressure against the wound.

"Fuck." I said matter-of-factly to the eerily silent white world around me. I wavered slightly when I made to stand up again. I looked down at the snowy ground.

Jeez, that was a lot of blood.

--

Dr. Cox was not worried.

Dr. Cox didn't get worried. That was something that was simply _not done_ in this version of his reality, which he had carefully constructed for himself and those around him.

Dr. Cox _certainly_ wouldn't get anxious.

He was just very, very mad. Who the hell just disappeared in the middle of their shifts? What a completely irresponsible thing to do!

Barbie had said he had walked out the hospital.

_In his scrubs_.

He stared at the contents of the locker.

Jacket, scarf, wallet, keys to that ridiculous scooter of his. Even his phone was in here, which explained why he hadn't returned any of the calls they had made.

Dr. Cox didn't get worried.

A cough behind him made him snap back to reality and he idly wondered how long he had been standing there, just staring.

He slammed the locker closed with a lot more force than was strictly necessary.

"And?"

"And what?" He snarled.

"Found what you were looking for?"

He grunted and turned around.

The janitor shrugged, swinging an out of proportion couple of cutting pliers in his hand. "I could still, you know, jam his locker for you."

Dr. Cox eyed the pliers. "I'm sure I'm going to regret asking, bu-ut... _Why _did you take that thing with you if you knew you weren't going to use it anyway seeing that you, for some disturbing reason, know his locker code?"

"Oh, this thing? I've been wanting to use it for ages! I've got all of these useless tools lying around, never used them once. That's why my offer for jamming his locker still stands." He made a few 'snip-snip' movements.

Dr. Cox growled and strode out of the locker room.

He couldn't possible _walk_ home without a jacket in this weather, right? Maybe he had taken the bus.

Dr. Cox didn't get worried.

Dr. Cox only got more angry.

Wait till he got his hands on Newbie.

---

I didn't even know where in the woods I was. I had run blindly away from the car before getting shot for my trouble. I had scrambled back up and ran on, ignoring the pain as the adrenaline coursed through my body.

I had heard the screeching of tires after a while, though. I guess that bastard just left me here to die.

I was in the middle of nowhere now and I didn't even have a cell phone or anything. God. Why hadn't I just listened to Dr. Cox and taken that break?

_And left that guy to kill someone else instead of me._

No.

And come on! I'm not dead yet. Keep being positive here, brain!

I stumbled through the vegetation, hopefully out of the woods and towards where I thought the dirty rocky sand road that led us here had been. My right hand was on my shoulder, pressing against my make-shift bandage that was already soaked through. My breathes were short and rapid, my skin clammy and I was sweating profusely.

Sweating!

I was freezing and sweating. And I was tired… My heart hammered in my ears, and I felt like sitting down to rest for a bit…

My head shot up. Shock. I had to get to the highway before I lost consciousness.

I wavered from tree to tree, painfully aware that I wasn't walking in a straight line as my dizziness overwhelmed me. The only thing I could hope for was that I had chosen the right direction. I hadn't gotten that far into the woods and if I could just get to the sandy side road, I could track it back towards the highway.

_For miles__…and every mile is two in winter..._ A mean little voice inside of my head whispered to me.

"Shut up." I mumbled, while continuing my way.

"Well that's not very nice."

I looked up.

"Sorry, Turk." I mumbled, looking up through unfocused eyes at my best friend, who mockingly looked hurt at my exclamation.

"Hey, don't sweat it!" He said with a laugh, but then stopped and eyed me critically. "You don't look too good there, vanilla bear."

"Yeah, well… that happens when people get shot, I guess." I muttered.

"What did I tell you about getting shot?" Turk said, hands on his hips in a not even that bad of an imitation of his wife.

"Don't?"

---

"You think he's all right?" Carla asked, concern written all over her face.

"Well, if he is I'm going to make sure he won't be." Dr. Cox snarled, fighting to get his coat on.

"I'll go! I can check the apartment to see if he's there!" Turk exclaimed, running up to them and skidding to a halt.

"I know you're absolutely terrified something might have happened to your _boyfriend, _ Ghandi, but you've got some important surgeries up ahead. As much as this pains me to say, my shift is over anyway and I'll check his place and make him understand what I think about this little stunt he pulled."

"Don't you dare touch him! I'm sure he had a good reason to leave!" Turk yelled after Dr. Cox. He had looked like a hurt little puppy when he heard he couldn't help search for JD, but now he looked like an overprotective and mostly angry mother hen.

"Oh, he better have." Dr. Cox grunted as he passed the exit doors into the snowy weather outside. He popped up his collar and tightened his scarf against the cold.

Damn, Newbie. You better have a really good one.

---

"-and those little toys you get out of those little eggs of chocolately goodness…" I mumbled feverishly.

I stopped.

I stood there silently staring numbly at my feet, which were slowly being covered by the snow that had started up again a few moments ago. My right hand dangled uselessly by my side, any attempts to keep pressure on the wound long forgotten. It had kind of stopped bleeding, anyway. Extreme cold will do that for you.

I stared silently, my head swimming with images and feverish hallucinations. Half an hour ago…or had it been an hour? I didn't even remember. I remembered happily talking to Dr. Cox at some point, who had been trudging towards the sandy road with me when I had finally discovered it through the trees. I had been so glad to see it, because it meant I had a way back to the highway…towards help.

I had exclaimed my joy and Dr. Cox had patted me on the back, telling me 'Well done!' and that we were going to be saved.

At that moment my subconscious kicked me so hard and I realized in shock that he couldn't be there. A hallucination.

Dr. Cox never told me I did a good job.

Now the hallucination was gone, and I almost felt sorry that my fever and blood loss induced daydream had faded away. I had enjoyed the company.

I had stumbled on, following the road towards the highway. I didn't even know how far I had gotten so far, but finally I had come to a standstill. Taking another step was unbearable.

And now I stared down. Down at my feet, and the small black object that had caused me to stop in the first place. Slowly a thought dwindled to the surface of my consciousness and I waited patiently as the firing synapses in my head gradually formed a coherent thought.

Pager.

Huh. Look at that.

I bent forward, a movement so deliberate and clumsy I was surprised I made it all. Finally my numb hand closed around it and I picked it up. I didn't have the strength to get back up though, so I let myself fall back onto the snow. Kelso would probably have docked the pager out of my pay if I had requested a new one. It was a good thing I had it back. I felt happy about it.

I smiled faintly.

I didn't even feel the bitter of the snow anymore as it seeped into my clothes and made everything that hadn't gone numb yet (admittingly a very small percentage of my body) go lifeless while I sat there staring at the sleek and marvelous little thing in my hands.

Somewhere, I felt a little gloomy I wasn't continuing my walk. Even though at the moment I couldn't recall where I had been going anyway, or why it was so important to be on foot at all.

Another thought drifted lazily up from the depths of my mind towards the clear sky that was his consciousness.

Pager.

I giggled slightly. Silly mind. You've already had that thought.

I stared.

And there it was. A wave of lucidity washed over me as I looked at the object of my affection and suddenly I felt the cold of the snow, the ache in my shoulder and I knew the implication of the pager in my hands.

It was a two way pager.

The only time the message 'out of range' would appear on it, was when I went into the densest and most inaccessible forest, far, far from civilization. It would certainly be in range when I was so close to the freeway.

It had a small keypad and everything.

Oh god. I could page them. I could page for help, tell them where I was.

My frozen hands had trouble with the small keys and I was sure I misspelled every word, but who the hell cared. Halfway into the message, I drifted off to lala-land again for a while, but when another wave of clarity passed over me, I send the message and stared off with unclear eyes at the horizon.

So now I should wait. I could just wait for help. I was at least glad I didn't have to walk anymore, I hadn't felt any sensation in my feet for ages.

And I was drained.

So sleepy…

In the distance, the wind picked up and the snow fell heavy.

TBC

Like I said, reviews make me keep writing :)


	4. Chapter 4

AN: Thanks for the review. I hope you are still enjoying the story…

This chapter might be a little sad.

"_There is neither heaven nor earth, only snow, falling incessantly."_

_Chapter 4_

"Has he called yet?"

Carla sighed and softly stroked Turk over his bald head, which the surgeon had placed on the counter of the Nurses' station.

"Not yet, Turk. But don't worry, it's probably nothing." She soothed, trying to get some kind of reassuring tone in her voice even though she didn't feel it herself. Turk smiled unhappily just as Elliot came up to them and placed one of her patient's charts on the counter.

"Any news yet?" She asked, frowning slightly.

"No." Carla and Turk said in unison. Turk got up and fiddled with his scrubs, looking as miserable as Carla had ever seen him. She turned her attention back to Elliot.

"Elliot? Did you notice, you know, anything unusual about JD when he left?" She asked politely, observing Elliot's brow furrow in thought.

"Well, he seemed kind of nervous about something when he came out of the examination room."

"And before that? Did he mention having any kind of appointment before he started at the clinic?"

"No, Carla, nothing. You think I wouldn't mention something important like that?" Elliot said, looking insulted.

"No of course not-" Carla began, feeling she had just lost control of the conversation.

"He just seemed like his normal self. A bit tired maybe and a little unhappy he was just about to start his clinic duty, but nothing unusual." Elliot said with a shrug, then she stopped and frowned slightly.

"But he was in there with that patient for the longest time…" She mused softly, making Carla strain to catch what she said. "Now I think about it, I found that strange. And after he came out he was a bit agitated, but I thought he just needed a break from the work stress."

"I bet I would have noticed immediately if something was wrong!" Turk said, taking a deep breathe and puffing up his chest. "I can read him like a book!"

"I'm sure you can, honey." Carla said soothingly.

"Well, you weren't there, were you, Turk!" Elliot pointed out, annoyed. "You all pretend like I don't know JD at all! I'm telling you, he just looked a little tired and nervous."

Turk opened his mouth to say something but stopped as if he suddenly realized something.

"Tapes!"

Carla and Elliot just looked at him in confusion for a few seconds.

"There's a security camera in the lobby! We can just look at the tape! I'm telling you, if something was wrong… I'll be able to spot it immediately." Turk grinned like a proud little kid.

"That's not even that bad of an idea…" Carla mused.

---

The man grabbed his steering wheel a little tighter. The kid had been innocent, and he had practically pushed him to his death. He had called for him in the forest, but as he had expected, there had been no answer.

He looked out onto the snowy road, dazed. He felt strange.

The kid had been innocent. He just left him to there die. The sudden realization hit him hard. Why had he left? Everything seemed like a dream… a bad nightmare.

His body began shaking. Oh god, how had he allowed such a thing to happen? He was a hypocrite. He was no better than any other criminal, he felt disgusted with himself.

He had sworn to himself this would never happen. Had sworn this kind of thing never happened. The world was easy; Innocent and guilty people.

He had thought he had been the innocent person, getting revenge on the guilty person. But now he was a guilty person who had killed an innocent person.

He deserved no better than any other criminal.

He could have called the police…. No, the kid was dead. It didn't matter. He just had to make sure that it couldn't be traced back to him…to his family. His family had been through enough, they didn't need him to only make things worse.

No.

He gripped his steering wheel if only to make the shaking stop, to make this horrible feeling stop consuming him. But he knew it would not stop. It would be there forever. He couldn't live with that.

He wouldn't live with that. He looked up, through the snow, and saw a truck passing a car in the other driving lane, slowly coming his way in the opposite direction.

He deserved no better than any other guilty person.

With sudden deliberation, the man steered to the left.

The headlights of the truck illuminated the inside of the car, the snowflakes casting shadows on the man's face.

---

Dr. Cox's hands were visibly clenched around his steering wheel, his knuckles turning white. It was crazy driving in this kind of weather. Turning on the car lights had only caused the snowflakes to be more brightly illuminated instead of creating more visibility. At least the freeway was coming up in a few moments, which meant the road would be more visible because of all the ploughing that was being done there.

He almost whished he had stayed back at the hospital, but then Carla and Ghandi would have completely obsessed over little newbie's fate, and certainly Carla would have given him hell for not going out looking for him. Frankly, he could not wait to find Newbie.

Not because he was worried. To be honest he was almost giddy with excitement; newbie would get hell from him. He really wanted to know how the kid was going to talk himself out of this one. He probably had one of his silly daydreams and pranced outside following his imaginary magical unicorn. Or maybe the stress and all the girl's names had finally made him snap and finally realize that he really was the girl Dr. Cox had always told him he was. He growled in anger. He was going to have a field day with this.

Ah. The freeway. Newbie's new apartment was some way off from downtown and the hospital, but at least it was accessible by the main road, which made it a little easier to navigate in this weather.

Dr. Cox listened to the faint guitar strumming that floated up from his radio, after which a radio report came on telling whatever listener out there about the heavy snowfall and the problems it causing with local traffic. It proceeded to tell of certain local car accidents and which roads to steer clear off.

"And we have report of a wrong way driver causing an accident on the 510, blocking off the main road. And now we continue our music with-"

Dr. Cox cursed and shut the radio off in frustration. This was going to cost some time! He just wanted to go home… If the 510 was blocked he had to get off the freeway here and take the other highway to the north and get off again at the second junction towards the lower suburbs. One Barbie undoubtedly took many times when she had that silly fellowship at the North County University Medical Centre.

Now he was thinking about Barbie, why in god's name would he do that to himself? He gripped the steering wheel a little bit tighter. If Barbie had paid a little more attention or had stopped newbie in the first place, he himself wouldn't be driving towards that girl's home in the middle of a snow storm after a long shift at this very moment.

He cursed some more because it made him feel better. Then he almost caused an accident himself when his pager went off, giving him a near heart attack. He fought to get his car back under control and peered through the heavy snowfall as his right hand found it's way to his belt and struggled with the clasp of the pager to get it off.

Finally he raised the pager to eye level and he cast a quick glance at it, hoping it was some news from Carla or Ghandi, or even Barbie, that they had found JD asleep in the on call room or something.

He read the message.

He reread the message.

He swerved passed a braking car, nearly hitting it, cursing excessively at himself because he hadn't been paying attention to the road. The cursing didn't make him feel any better this time.

Well, at least he was already on the right highway, a small part of his brain, that wasn't filled with fury or sickening worry, silently observed.

---

"Jeez, Elliot! Just look at him!" Turk exclaimed, holding his hand up in the air as if to enlarge his already loud statement.

Elliot looked confused. "He looks a little nervous, so what?" She said, defensively.

"It looks like he is screaming with his eyes!"

Carla cast a sceptical glance at Turk. "How can you see that?"

"It's obvious! And I've never seen him so agitated… and look," Turk pointed at the monitor. "He keeps casting looks at this guy."

They looked at the guy on the TV screen, standing at the entrance hall.

Suddenly, Carla gasped.

"I remember that guy!" She elbowed Turk "You know that guy!" She looked impatiently at him and Elliot, who both just stared blankly back at her.

"He was on TV a few days ago, he was that guy who got released from prison after he had been in there for four years! But he was innocent! Don't you remember?"

Elliot frowned and Turk still had a empty look on his face.

"You really don't know, do you? They found the guy that really did it, he admitted to all the charges and this man was released. He did this whole speech about the injustice of the justice system that they just incarcerate innocent people and what not."

Elliot swallowed. "You don't think he really did it after all, do you?" She whispered.

They all looked at each other.

---

"Come on, Newbie, you think you can stay here forever?"

"..'s warm, snugly…"

"The hospital doesn't pay you to lie around all day."

"…justafew more minut's…"

"Get off your ass, Pricella, you've got work to do!"

My eyes flew open and I immediately regretted the decision as the bright light bore into my brain, making my head hurt and my eyes water. I felt sick to my stomach, but more importantly, I realized I wasn't lying in bed in the on call room. I was lying in the snow, looking up at the stormy sky. When I turned my gaze to my lower extremities I noticed I had partly snowed over. How long had I been lying there?

Everything hurt. And I had the sneaking suspicion that everything that wasn't hurting was just because it was too numb from the cold to feel anything. Strange how the snow had felt so warm and safe. Even now, it wasn't an entirely uncomfortable thought to just let the cold seep into my bones and to let the numbness take the pain away.

I'd once read that falling asleep in the snow was the most peaceful way to go if you simply didn't want to go on anymore.

I made a silent observation about how strange it seemed that my thoughts came so easily and peacefully and that I had still not made any attempt to get up. Now that I thought about it, the visualisation of movement already seemed unbearable. I turned my head, a movement that was slowly and carefully performed, yet still made my vision swim and my stomach turn.

Whiteness as far as I could see, covering the land far and wide.

Maybe I was dead already. Maybe it had been snowing for days, years even. Maybe snow was all that remained until the very end.

A faint smile played on my lips. This didn't seem that bad an end. It was unspeakably beautiful even.

I watched the snow fall.

After a few minutes of this I felt myself grow more and more tired, however, sleep seemed still at bay and I felt myself thinking that the end, this Ultimate Ending, this waiting was endless. It left me time to think about things.

Ah! Maybe that was it. They always said that your life flashes before your eyes before you die. Well, maybe death was waiting for me to do just that.

My brow furrowed in silent contemplation as I tried my best to recall certain memories. To be honest, everything seemed kind of fuzzy. Where to start?

Wait, hadn't I been hallucinating about a hospital?

Yes. I was doctor. That was it.

Memories poured over me and I lay there blinking away the snowflakes. I found myself grinning with the silly bits and frowning with the serious ones. And still they came, tumbling over each other in their haste to reach my consciousness. They flash passed so fast I almost have not time to let them sink in-

I am eight and I am making a drawing for Santa, which he takes with a big laugh and tells me which is very nicely done. I smile in happiness and proceed to pull his beard down and discover he is an imposter-

I am twenty-four , fighting for the TV remote with Turk. He wins and I pout as he makes me watch my first Gilmore Girls episode, which strangely I like-

Turk. I remember Turk.

I am six, getting ready for school and making my own lunch, which my mom forgets to make because she was still asleep-

I wish she had paid more attention to me.

I am nineteen, Turk and I find Rowdy at a garage sale. We take him home with us and wash him. We always wanted a puppy-

I am twenty-five and I start my first day at Sacred Heart hospital and I meet Elliot. I smirk at Turk's fallen face when Elliot tells us she's medical intern and not a surgical-

That's when I met Dr. Cox.

I am sixteen, I am at a party at a friend's house. I share my first kiss with Sarah Briggs while standing outside under the moonlight. Someone pukes in the bushes behind us-

I am twenty-eight, I drive Sasha for the first time-

I am twelve, I discover that I want to be a doctor-

I am thirty, Dr. Cox says thank you and calls me by my name-

I am five, I scream for my daddy after I scrape my knee-

I am twenty-nine, Turk and me are laughing at something-

I am fourteen, yelling at my brother-

I am thirty-one, lying in a field of snow, waiting for whatever comes next.

God. I miss everybody already.

"You gonna leave me, vanilla bear?"

I turned my head and saw Turk sitting in the snow, looking absolutely miserable.

"I…I'm sorry." I mumbled, which cost me a lot of energy to pull off. Then I remembered Turk wasn't really there anyway. Carla showed up behind him, and placed a hand on his shoulder.

"You know, we're going to miss you." She said, and then kneeled to stroke my hair softly. I blinked a few times, trying to think her away before I would give in and start crying, making a complete fool of myself. Then suddenly, there was only snow where she had been standing. I sighed sadly when I realised I wouldn't have made a fool of myself anyway, because I was talking to my own hallucinations.

"She's right. I am going to miss you."

"…You're not real." I managed to point out, as I refocused on Turk, who was still sitting in the snow.

"Yeah…" Turk smiled apologetically and got up. He stared at me uncertainly.

"I better leave you to it then…" He walked away, but before he disappeared from view he turned and gave me a small wave. I felt my heart clench as I watched him turn.

"Remember! At the milkshake pool on the Lesbian cloud! You better be waiting for me…" And with that, he was gone.

My breathing came in laboured gasps. God, this hurt. This would have been so much easier if my brain just let me pass on in peace without hammering these hallucination on me, trying to get me to get up. I briefly wondered what my last thought was going to be, and felt like it was probably about the fact that I couldn't blame my brain for trying. That's survival instinct for you…

Silence as the snow fell heavily, falling on my face and melting away with each of my shorter and shorter desperate gasps for air. Somewhere in the distance, some kind of rumbling. Probably the storm on it's way to cover me up, erasing any trace that I was here. I let myself start to drift, away from the hurt.

"JD?"

God. Just leave me in peace already. I blinked hazily and saw a figure standing a few meters away, a figure strangely resembling Dr. Cox.

"….goaway….you're an hallucination…" I muttered faintly, the sentence taking the last bit of my energy with it. I felt my consciousness slipping and I let my eyes flutter closed.


	5. Chapter 5

AN: Thanks for the reviews, I appreciate them a lot.

Also, sorry for the dark tone this story's getting. I promise it will pick up a bit before the end of the story… Probably.

Can't give too much away, though.

Enjoy…

* * *

"_You only live twice. Once when you are born and once when you look death in the face"_

_Ian Fleming _

Chapter 5

"No, wait!" Dr. Cox held out a hand for the warming blanket as the ambulance bounced and tore across the highway and through the snow back towards Sacred Heart hospital. The medic looked at him, confused.

"He is severely hypothermic ! We need to get his core temperature to rise!"

"His hypothermia may be the only thing protecting him right now!" Dr. Cox yelled above the wailing of the sirens, holding a hand on the blanket. "Rising his core body temperature will induce the blood flow, causing him to go into shock. Hell, he already lost enough blood as it is. His hypothermia is causing a lower demand of oxygen from his body, he might get hypoxic if we warm him because the demand will rise. I think we need to keep his body temperature at a controlled low level."

"We're not equipped to induce a therapeutic hypothermia."

"Well he already is hypothermic so shut the fucking radiator off then, hell, I don't care! Wait till we're at the hospital."

"He has a severe case of tachycardia, not rising his core body temperature will only induce this problem, making him go into cardiac arrest!" The medic pointed out and Cox growled.

"Unfortunately, shock would pose the same problem! This is our best option." He looked down at JD. His skin has sickly blue tone to it, an IV snaked out of both of his arms, they had immediately started blood transfusion. One of JD's hands was clenched into a fist, and when Dr. Cox pried it open he found the thing that JD was keeping such a death grip on was his pager.

It had been his last lifeline and it had saved him. Would save him. Dr. Cox could only imagine what had happened to JD.

When he had first found the kid, alone in the middle of nowhere, covered in blood and lying in the snow, he hadn't believed his eyes for several moments. JD had muttered something at him, obviously delirious and slipped into unconsciousness when he had approached. Had he had not said something, Dr. Cox would have thought him dead for sure.

He had already called for an ambulance when he had still been in the car on his way over; he could make sense of JD's page that someone or other had been shot although thanks to the unclear wording and horrible spelling he had not realised it had been JD himself.

He had checked for a pulse, and found a weak and rapid one, fluttering fast under his fingers.

He had seen the makeshift bandage, and checked the wound, whistling between his teeth when he saw the damage, trying to calm his panic. He had taken the kid carefully into his arms, extremely worried when this elicited not a single response from newbie, and taken him to the car.

He had started up the car, noting again how with every bounce or bump newbie gave not even a single moan. Finally he had gone back up the highway, keeping a weary eye on his unconscious passenger as he went ahead to meet the ambulance. He had stopped along the road when he saw the flashing lights in the distance and flagged them over while he got JD out of the car again, but then he had noticed that the younger doctor's breathing was almost completely non-existent.

A sharp turn made Dr. Cox snap back to the here and now as he saw one of the paramedics cutting away JD's scrubs and keeping pressure on his gunshot wound while the other held the oxygen mask in place. They were back in the city now, and not far away from the hospital.

"Hang in there, Newbie." He muttered, closing the cold and lifeless hand around the pager again. Unnoticed, in his own pocket, his cell phone went off but he did not notice it above the wailing of the siren.

---

"He's not picking up." Carla sighed and placed the receiver back on the hook. She hugged herself and frowned, looking worried. Elliot, Turk and she were standing around the Nurses' station all trying to hide their worry. Turk failed, miserably.

"I should have never thrown away that walkie-talkie watch!" He moaned, burying his face in his arms on the counter. Elliot and Carla looked him, briefly wondering what he was talking about.

"We could call the police…" Elliot voiced, looking doubtful at her own suggestion.

"And tell them what, exactly? JD's been missing only for a few hours, they won't come just because we tell them 'he looked worried' on the security cameras. They won't do anything about missing persons until it's been at least a day…" Carla sighed and started pacing.

"Found him yet?" Came a voice from behind. She looked up and saw the janitor leaning on a mop and looking much too happy for her liking. She noticed he was sporting a scarf, red with little blue penguins on it, which she thought was odd. She slowly shook her head.

"No…"

"Hey!" The sudden exclamation alarmed her as she saw Turk scrambling up into a standing position. He strode over to the janitor and grabbed the scarf. "This is JD's!"

"Says who? Don't see his name on it." The janitor said smartly, pulling the scarf back from Turk and flinging it across his shoulder. Turk squinted his eyes, looking angry.

"I found it fair and square, finder's keepers, eh?"

"And where, may I ask, did you find it?" Carla asked sternly, placing her hands on her hips and glaring at the janitor.

"Oh, just lying around in the locker room…"

"Where in the locker room?"

"Well, you know, in a locker." The janitor said, waving his hand dismissively. Carla sighed and rolled her eyes. Elliot blinked and frowned.

"Janitor… You really surprise me, you can't just take people's stuff like that! Don't you remember that lost and found box? Here, give it to me and I will return it." She said, sounding surprised by the Janitor's behaviour. She held out a hand and the janitor groaned; he had forgotten about her. With a glare at Turk, he slowly and deliberately unwrapped the scarf from his neck and offered it to Elliot.

"Here you go, miss." He said and turned around to go and finish whatever mopping job he had been busy with. At least he still had Scooter's… well, _scooter_ keys. He grinned.

Elliot wrapped the scarf around her neck and buried her face in it, smiling.

"Hmm, snugly." She muttered.

Now the distraction was over, Turk looked back sadly at the scarf and Elliot. The scarf was there to remind him of JD and how his vanilla bear was probably out there in the freezing cold without it. Carla saw his look and reached out to him in an effort to comfort him.

"Baby…"

Just then Turk's pager went off and he jumped in surprise and looked down. He grimaced and shrugged with his shoulder apologetically.

"Sorry, Baby, emergency surgery, they're just bringing the patient in. I gotta go." And with that, he took off down the hallway. Carla and Elliot watched him go and then looked at each other.

"What are we going to do now?"

"I'll try phoning Dr. Cox again…" Carla said glumly.

---

"Come on…" The heart monitor incessant whine filled the cabin. One. Two. Three. He let go of the pump. The violent zap of the defibrillator.

"Come on!" Dr. Cox yelled, ready to tear his hair out. Behind him the doors of the ambulance were flung open as they arrived at the hospital.

"I've got a pulse!" The paramedic screamed, letting go of the defibrillator. "It's barely there…" Strong hands came from behind, taking the bed out of the ambulance. Holding the IV, the paramedic jumped off the ambulance behind the other staff and ran with the gurney. Dr. Cox let out a shaking breathe, filled with relief, as he also followed them, running to catch up.

"We need to get him to surgery immediately, is everything prepped?" He heard someone say, he looked down at newbie as he ran. They were placing a ventilator, JD's face obscured by the mask and the machine as they wheeled him to the OR. The closed eyes, the messy hair, the sickly pale skin. The gurney flew through the OR doors and Dr. Cox slowly came to a halt, staring at the doors as they closed behind them.

He stood there, seconds passing. Then his eyes slowly shifted down to his hands, noticing the blood covering them. Suddenly his head snapped back up and he looked purposefully down the hall. He started walking.

He passed several doctors and nurses on the way, ignoring their startled looks when they saw him stride by. Finally, he arrived at the nurses station and saw those who he had been looking for. Carla and Elliot had their backs to them. Carla had the phone to her ear.

Dr. Cox slowed. How was he going to tell them? They didn't know anything yet. Maybe it was better if-

Suddenly his cell phone went off. Carla and Elliot looked behind them, startled at the noise. They looked even more alarmed when they saw him.

"Dr. Cox!" Carla said, surprised. "I thought-"

Elliot cut her off; "Oh my god! Whose blood is that? What happened—are you hurt?" The words tumbled out her mouth like a waterfall and Dr. Cox grimaced.

Nice move, there, coming back in his normal clothes, covered in blood and looking crazy eyed. He bet his hair was standing up because he had been pulling it so much back in the ambulance.

Carla saw his look and froze. Slowly, she put the phone down. In his pocket, Dr. Cox's cell phone stopped ringing.

"Where is JD?" The question was calm, but he could hear the urgency in it. Silence followed it and he noted they were waiting for him to break it.

"He-" Dr. Cox faltered. He sighed, rubbing his neck awkwardly. "He was shot."

Carla eyes widened and Elliot gasped and clapped her hands over her mouth. "It wasn't- I- He was – " He hated their worried faces, wanted to take the worry away. "It isn't really that bad a injury, but he was out there for a long time and-". He failed.

"…he lost a lot of blood" He finished slowly. Carla and Elliot stood, frozen.

Then, very slowly, Carla took in a breathe. "Where is he?" She asked, her voice stern but wavering ever so slightly.

"In the ER, we just brought him in. I don't know…" He let the sentence die out. What else was their to say? Newbie had gone into cardiac arrest. It could go any which way now, he had no way of knowing.

A soft sob escaped Elliot's lips and he decided there and then not to tell them that JD's heart had stopped. Ever.

"Where's….Where's that husband of yours, Carla?" He couldn't make himself use any of the stupid nicknames he had for that black surgeon.

The question had an effect he had not been expecting. Carla en Elliot looked at each other in shock.

"No…" Carla whispered and then gave Dr. Cox an alarmed look. "He was paged! Emergency surgery… You don't think?"

A weight fell on Dr. Cox. Good god, no. Without warning, without any idea what to expect. Ghandi would freak, would freeze up!

---

"Aortic clamp."

Turk held out his hand and received the instrument as he worked to stop the bleeding. This guy was pretty banged up. He looked over to the heart monitor and grimaced behind his surgical mask.

He had to block off this artery quickly now. He worked feverishly, his hands a blur of different instruments as time passed. He wasn't an emergency surgeon, he wasn't really used to dealing with cases like this. But it just so happened he was on call and that one emergency surgeon was busy with another surgery and the other on call surgeon was stuck in the snow. Just his luck.

Suddenly the heart monitor beeped.

"Doctor!" The surgical assistant looked at him alarm as the patient's vitals plummeted.

No…Had he nicked something? Turk looked in alarm down at the patient and then back at the heart monitor, blood was pooling from of the wound. He had to do something quickly. He turned around the grab an instrument of the tray and cast a quick look down at the guy's face, which was obscured from his working position by green surgical sheets and not to mention the oxygen mask and tubing.

So familiar. The hair… the face.

He froze. Coldness gripped his heart as he stared in shock.

"Dr. Turk?"

He backed off. This couldn't be. No. Why?

"Dr. Turk! He's going into cardiac arrest! We need to do something _now._"

The insistent whine of the heart monitor made him snap back to the situation at hand.

He couldn't do this.

A nurse pushed passed him, reaching for the crash cart as valuable seconds ticked passed.

No, he would have to do this. _Needed _to do this.

He was a doctor.

---

Dr. Cox paced up and down the doctors lounge. Carla and Elliot were sitting on the couch, Elliot's eyes following him as she snuggled with her scarf, as if it gave her some kind of comfort. Ever so often a sob would escape her. Carla just stared at the wall with a stony face, not saying anything.

Carla was creeping him out the most. He couldn't deal with this right now. He looked down at his hands again, noticing he had still forgotten to wash Newbie's blood off. Frankly, he found that he couldn't care less about his looks right now.

This waiting was driving him mad! He needed to do something, needed to get out… He let out an irritated growl and changed direction towards the door. However, before he had even the change to get close to it, the door suddenly opened with an incessant creak.

All of their eyes snapped to it.

Turk appeared in the opening, looking around him with a dazed expression. His eyes fell on Carla, not even noticing Dr. Cox. Gradually he let go of the doorknob and took a step in her direction, as if she was the anchor of his universe and was pulling him in.

Dr. Cox's heart clenched. Ghandi looked so… crestfallen.

Turk lowered his eyes. "My patient, it was…" He faltered, the last part of the sentence dying on his lips. He looked up slowly and swallowed.

"I think I just killed him."

* * *

TBC

Good god, I'm cruel, no? Sorry about that.

I've been noticing that lots of people are adding this story to their story alert, but you have to know that nothing keeps a writer going like a good review… Thanks :)


	6. Chapter 6

AN: And here's the next chapter… Thank you for the reviews

:)

* * *

"_Worry is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained."_

_Arthur Somers Roche_

Chapter 6

Buzzing, around me. I wish it would go away, it somehow irritated me. I want it to be quiet, the whole world to disappear. I just wanted to sleep and sleep and sleep. So tired.

Weight, on my chest. Something, in my mouth, tickling my throat, it felt so rough. I found I could not breathe, yet somehow I was not distressed. It briefly made me wonder, but that, too, disappeared as I felt so tired. I could not keep my attention on it.

Voices. Somewhere. They sounded alien and distressed, yet again I found I could not make myself care about them. My consciousness wavered and I slipped back inside my own mind, where it was dark and silent and calm. Here I could stay, here I could come and rest and regain my energy. I looked around, my thoughts came sluggish yet when they arrived they were bold and clear.

I was cold in here. Silence so intense that my mind began filling it up with sounds of it's own making. Slowly I became aware of the buzzing of my own body and every single process that made me vibrate with the feeling of being alive. Somewhere, something felt wrong.

---

Dr. Cox was on Turk in two long steps, grabbing the front of his scrubs with both of his hands and slamming him against the door. The surgeon looked at him, seemingly noticing him for the first time, alarm evident in his eyes.

"What do you mean you killed him!" Dr. Cox bellowed, his face contorted in fury, although his eyes told a different story; Fear looked out of them. Turk held up his hands as if to protect himself.

"I- what?" Turk managed to say, shooting a glance at his shocked-looking wife on the couch and then back at the angry face just inches away from his own.

"Answer the damn question! Is he dead?" Dr. Cox yelled, fire spitting out from his eyes. He found he wanted direct conformation, yet he dared Turk to say it. Dared him to shatter his world. He knew he was only angry because he could think of no other way to deal with his emotions right now. In his head, a fast mantra repeated over and over; No, no no no nononono.

Turk looked frightened and lost, looking for a hint of compassion in the older doctor's face. Finally, his shoulders sacked as if he resigned to his fate.

"Yes." He whispered. Dr. Cox's hands let go of Turk's scrubs, his hands flying up towards his head and he grabbed hold of his hair, a look of horror on his face. A deep chasm opened up below his feet, threatening to swallow him whole.

Turk looked at him, shock on his face when he saw the older man's reaction to the news. Behind them, Elliot had burrowed her face in the scarf and Carla got up, tears in her eyes, reaching out towards her husband.

---

Now that I paid attention to my surroundings, I could see it was also darker than I thought pleasant and I found that my former excitement of coming to this place evaporated as I came into contact with the frightening aspects of it. Clarity passed over me in waves, each one followed by tiredness, leaving me drained and exhausted. I wanted to let go and let my thoughts go as well, leaving everything behind, including this place. Somehow, though, a part of me fought against it.

I was frightened.

With each passing wave I felt more and more energy being lifted from me and taken into the dark abyss beyond my consciousness. Thoughts came slower and slower and finally just one clear one spun around in my mind.

Sleep.

And there, tiredness so intense fell over me, eliminating every single process in my mind. Slowly, the buzzing and vibrant feeling from before disappeared. Like a tsunami the exhaustion took a hold over me and I found I could not fight it any longer as I let myself be swept off my feet and carried in the sea of nothingness.

---

"I… I don't understand." Turk pointed out, still looking frightened. "What are you doing here?"

Dr. Cox looked at him with a dumfounded expression on his face. This wasn't exactly how he had thought Turk would deal with the loss.

Turk blinked several times. "You… you went looking for JD…" He said slowly. Dr. Cox and Carla exchanged a worried glance. Carla bit her lip and placed a hand on her husband's shoulder.

"Baby…"

This didn't have the expected result. Turk jumped up, startled by the touch, and his eyes suddenly went wide in horror. "Oh god! Something happened to JD!" His hand shot up towards his head in much the same manner as Dr. Cox had done and his face was filled with worry and sorrow. "Why! Why my vanilla bear? Tell me what happened!"

Carla looked utterly shocked and Dr. Cox, too, had trouble processing this reaction. The man had gone mad. Absolutely mad after losing his best friend and now he had thought up a reality in which JD was still alive… and they had just gone and shattered his world all over again…

Carla seemed ready to cry. "Baby, he… died." Her voice choked and she seemed helplessly small and vulnerable. "He died. Don't you remember? You just told us!"

Turk froze, his face a subtle mask, not betraying any of his emotions while behind it his mind was a flurry of thunderstorms full of rage and heart-broken grief, but above all; confusion.

Slowly he opened his mouth and looked sideways to Dr. Cox, fixing him with a silent stare. "No… I just told you _my patient_ died…" His voice was calm and determined, yet his eyes dared the older doctor to say something that contradicted his own claim.

Suddenly, an idea formed in Dr. Cox's head and with it a terrifying idea of hope, too small and fragile that he didn't even want to give it any space lest he break his heart again for a second time. He returned the look with much the same expression on his face.

"Who… Who was your patient, Ghandi?" The nickname escaped his lips before he knew it. He couldn't help it, his mind was a mixture of strong emotions he was not very familiar with and he needed something to restore the normality of this place.

Turk looked away for a moment of two, confusion flashing across his face before he spoke up. "It was…. that g_uy._" He looked up then, alarmed. He glanced at his wife and also at Elliot, trying to catch their eyes.

"You know! That guy from the security camera footage. In the lobby!" Both Elliot and Carla just stared at him, unable to say anything to confirm what his ramblings. "I recognized him just as he went in cardiac arrest and I… I just froze, you know. I suddenly thought about JD and how this guy had kidnapped him or did something horrible to him, or… I don't know. Just _crazy _things…" He trailed off, looking miserable.

".. He died, because of me." He whispered. "He died because I was overcome with my own emotions, induced by some random crazy theories that hold no merit whatsoever. The guy probably had nothing to do with any of this in the first place."

Dr. Cox let out a breathe he hadn't realized he had been holding, relief washing over him.

"This… This is great news."

Turk's head shot up, looking angry. "_Great_? I just probably caused a man to die and you're calling this great news?"

"It's great news _your _patient died, Ghandi, because it means newbie _didn't_." Dr. Cox answered, calmly. This caused Turk to lapse in shocked and uncomfortable silence. Gradually he opened his mouth again to say something;

"Someone is going to tell me where JD is, _right now._"

---

The incessant wine of the heart monitor.

"Clear!"

The violent zap of the defibrillator.

"He's not responding!"

"Again! Clear!"

---

Now all four of them were sitting on the couch, looking steadily through the glass out into the hallway, daring anyone to venture close and open the door to come tell them bad news. Silence had settled a while ago, Elliot's tears had run dry and Turk and Carla just sat together, Carla absentmindedly rubbing her husband's back while they both stared into nothing. Dr. Cox was surprised he could sit still at all, but after the emotional roller coaster of a few moments ago, he felt drained and just wanted to sit. Worry was still so tangible in this room he almost felt the need to open a window and get a broom to sweep it out.

He sat up when het noticed two police officers following a doctor appearing in the hallway. The doctor approached a nurse and asked her something. The nurse pointed at the door, both police officers followed her finger and their eyes came to rest on the four of them sitting on the couch. Dr. Cox's heart began hammering in his chest.

The doctor led the two officers to the door and opened it, letting them inside. Four pairs of eyes stared silently at the newcomers. One of the policemen took off his cap and brushed off some wet snow while the other stepped towards him and held up a badge.

"Are you Dr. Turk and Dr. Cox?" He asked as he glanced at the surgeon and the older doctor. Turk's hand, on top of Carla's leg, grasped it more tightly and he looked frightened. Dr. Cox blinked and fought to find his voice.

"Yes." It sounded rough.

"I'm here to talk to you about Dr. Dorian."

---

Pain, exploding in my chest and radiating outward, everywhere it went it caused my body to convulse and tingle, tearing my mind from the depths of whatever black abyss it had been in.

Good god! I'm awake! I'm awake!

I wanted to scream this at whatever was causing the sensation. However, my voice did not come and I found my mouth did not cooperate, because it was filled with something, stuffed down my throat. I wanted to cough and splutter yet nothing happened and I blindly panicked.

What the hell?

Slowly I calmed down again when I noticed nothing actually changed and that panicking didn't help much. I wasn't lying in my bed and I hadn't overslept like I thought I had. I was somewhere else but I couldn't remember where. My mind was still very fuzzy and my eyes wouldn't open.

Darkness surrounded me and the buzzing from before returned, quite loudly. Now, however, I found the buzzing to be almost like a lullaby and the darkness like a blanket snugly covering me. This… this wasn't really all that frightening.

There were voices again, sounding less agitated and less alien. And an unremitting slow beeping. It all felt much less daunting and I found it kind of reassuring to hear the voices and the beeping seemed to signify something important although I couldn't put my finger on it.

As I listened I found my concentration wavering again and the buzzing and beeping united into an endless harmony that let me drift gradually back to sleep, although now it felt more like a nap and the permanence of the sensation from before had disappeared. Still, a feeling of worry lingers as I let the blackness overtake me once again.

---

Dr. Cox turned the object in his hand slowly over and over, silently staring at it. This process had been going on for the past few minutes now.

It was JD's nametag.

The policemen had wanted to take it with them again, but he had kind of gotten cross with them and given them such a good ranting that the officers had thought it safer to just scamper out of the room without it.

The police had talked to them for quite some time. They had told him several things. And now Dr. Cox was mulling them over.

They had found the nametag in a car. A car that had collided with a truck, blocking off the 510, causing Dr. Cox to need to take the other route to JD's residence, which resulted in him being able to respond much more quickly to JD's cry for help when the kid had paged him.

The car had been the property of a man. The man had been badly injured in the car crash and when the firemen had gotten him out of his car the man had been rushed to the nearest hospital. Sacred Heart. He arrived almost simultaneously with the ambulance that had carried Dr. Cox and JD. Turk had been paged for Emergency surgery. Turk had operated not on JD but on the man from the car crash.

The man who somehow had JD's nametag in his car…

The truck driver had told the police that the man had just suddenly veered onto his road and headed straight for him, even tough the small car had been manoeuvrable enough to avoid the truck… The police were treating it as a deliberate collision.

The police told them that they were familiar with the man's history in prison and his history of mental problems… The man was kind of schizophrenic, switching between a crazy, violent personality and normal, almost docile personality. For years it had gone unnoticed, as the crazy part of the man's personality admitted to every crime they threw at him, often with detailed recollections. When the man began admitting crimes that he couldn't possibly have committed because he had been in prison during them, they finally had let a shrink take a look at him. He had gotten pills, to control his schizophrenic-like switches in personality and all had gone well for months. He had been released from prison after the police had been assured he wasn't any danger to society.

Dr. Cox had laughed at that. No danger to society…

The police had found a gun in the man's car, with a bullet missing and after that they had found JD's nametag, with blood on it… and a full unopened bottle of medicine. Well, naturally they had come to Sacred Heart to ask about Dr. Dorian and there they found out that he was currently in surgery because he had been shot.

No danger for society as long someone kept an eye on him and made sure the guy took his meds… Dr. Cox had laughed at that, too. The police had looked at him funnily.

It wasn't very hard to figure out that Turk's first crazy theory had probably been spot on. Yet, what had been the reason for this bizarre behaviour? The man was dead now, they couldn't ask him. And newbie… well, time would only tell if he was going to be able to talk, let alone fill in any of the details…

Elliot had told them the man had been in the waiting room of the hospital for more than an hour asking for Dr. Cox himself…

The police had taken a look at the security footage as well.

JD had gone in the examination room. The man had come out. JD had come out. They had both left…

…And several hours later Dr. Cox had found him unconscious in a field of snow with a gunshot wound.

The police asked to be alerted when newbie regained consciousness. Dr. Cox had grinned at that, probably unsettling them even more. After that, the whole fight about the ID-card had gone down and they had left him alone. Now he was sitting in the doctor's lounge again.

Dr. Cox twirled the card in his hand, looking at the smiling face of his protégé as it stared at him. His other hand was gripping the seat's arm rest so hard all the colour had drained from it.

The nurses and interns went out of their way not to disturb him, unless it be with some good news.

TBC

* * *

You don't want to know what kind of sadistic glee I got of people screaming "No! Did you just kill off JD? It cannot be so!"

Yes. I am evil.

Tell me exactly how evil I am with that little review button below! :)

Thanks for reading and until next time… when we see what becomes of our poor JD :(


	7. Chapter 7

AN: Thanks a bunch for the reviews, you are all awesome :) Sorry for the late update, though, I've been really busy with things like painting my new room and stuff like that. (Argh, I'm so sore right now I can hardly move x.x)

Btw, sorry if you got this updated twice. I wanted to change one silly thing...

Well, on with the chapter:

* * *

_The best things in life come in threes, like friends, dreams, and memories._

_Unknown  
_

Chapter 7

A beach. I wriggled my toes into the gray sand, the grains rubbing against my feet as I stood on the banks of my own imagination, the deep, dark water producing silent waves of thought that only barely reached the sandy shore of my consciousness. They seemed like tender lovers ever so carefully kissing each other, afraid to touch each others lips. I looked up at the gray sun in the gray sky, letting the meagre rays fall on my skin, allowing myself to soak up whatever warmth I could get in this place.

There was no colour here, curiously enough. My daydreams had always been in full colour, so dreaming in black and white was a strange experience for me. Yet, being able to dream at all was somehow significant and comforting; the upsetting feeling that the dark and crushing darkness from before had produced still lingered, like a thunderstorm still a long way off in the distance yet one that you can still hear rumble. However, right now my mind filled the darkness with pleasant images and this relieved me greatly.

I sat down and let the sand glide through my outstretched fingers, watching in fascination. The sudden urge to built a sand castle welled up inside of me, produced by some kind of childish instinct. I smiled slightly and the urge passed again; somehow I couldn't really bring myself to do anything in here than just to sit and stare out onto the sea.

The sand between my toes, the soft breeze in my hair and the sunlight on my skin. Everything felt so real, even though there was a definite absence of sound and colour. Yet, I knew I was inside my own mind and that it was somehow different from my normal daydreams and that I probably wouldn't be leaving any time soon. I couldn't much remember what had caused me to end up here. In fact, I couldn't remember much, period. All the same, I hadn't really given my lack of memories any thought and hadn't really pushed myself to recollect anything, so I wasn't really all that worried.

For now, I was content to just _be._

---

He felt a weird feeling in his stomach. One he couldn't easily identify and this scared him a little. Or maybe the scared feeling had been there already, produced by this feeling, but he couldn't know for sure. All he knew was that he felt strange. And that he had been hovering silently outside this patient room for the better part of an hour now, occasionally sneaking glances inside through the blinds.

He had been mopping up something or other by the ambulance entrance when a medical team had burst through the doors, shouting things at each other, pushing a gurney. A sight which wasn't uncommon, this was a hospital after all. However, he had seen angry doctor running behind it, looking, well, angry. Still, not unusual. The reaction of angry doctor after the medical team had disappeared into the OR had been unusual, though. The janitor couldn't help it, he had been curious and he had followed him when angry doctor had stormed off again. That's why he had overheard him talking to blonde doctor and scary nurse.

It seemed like hours ago.

Maybe that was because it had been hours ago.

He stopped his mopping at looked through the blinds. Scooter looked pale and fragile and if it wasn't for the beeping and readout of the heart monitor, one could easily mistake him to be dead.

Actually, if the nurses' talk was anything to go by, Scooter had in fact been dead several times today, albeit temporarily. As he thought about this fact that weird feeling in his stomach bubbled up again and he frowned slightly while he looked at the several figures that were slumped in their seats next to the bed. As he watched, behind him there was skidding sound and a short yell and a loud thumb. He turned around.

"Floor's wet, madam."

---

Turk stirred and looked up, bleary eyed. He noticed the gray swirling mass of clouds and snow battling each other outside. The combination of the streetlamps and the whiteness of the snow gave off an eerie colour, reflecting endlessly throughout the night and causing one who looked out the window to feel that the room was isolated in a sea of gray, turbulent violence. The storm was picking up strength and the wind tore at the windows.

The slow, rhythmic beeping of the heart monitor brought him to look upon the figure on the bed. JD looked worse than he had ever seen him in his life. The oxygen tube snaked out of his mouth, obscuring part of his face. He looked pale and broken and his eyes were unnaturally still, black smudges underneath them. Turk gingerly reached out to grab his friend's right hand, which lay still upon the covers, and gently squeezed it. His eyes travelled to JD's bandaged left shoulder. Next to him, Carla stirred in her sleep, murmuring something in Spanish. Elliot sat slumped in her seat opposite of them, her head lolled to the side, JD's scarf still wrapped tightly around her neck as if it provided some remote comfort.

Turk moved his head left and right and rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand. He had fallen asleep in an awkward position, he must have been sitting in this uncomfortable chair for hours now. He looked on his watch to see that it was 4 o'clock in the morning and he sighed sadly. Carla and him had decided to stay at the hospital. The storm was really bad right now and they didn't want to get stranded in it while heading home. Turk knew, however, that even if there hadn't been a storm he would still be sitting on this uncomfortable chair next to this bed right now. He couldn't leave his vanilla bear alone in a dark and cold hospital room like this. What if he woke up and no one was there to comfort him? If indeed he woke up.

He cast another glance at the heart monitor, denoting the fact that JD was alive yet not showing any sign of change for the past few hours. Hypothermic induced coma… He had almost squeezed Carla's hand off when the surgeon had come to talk to them about it. It could take days for JD to wake up. Until then they had no way of knowing if JD's multiple cardiac arrests had brought about any permanent damage…

Carla stirred again, her head upon his shoulder, her hair dangling in her face. Even after a double shift, emotional rollercoaster and after collapsing from exhaustion she looked like an angel while asleep. She frowned slightly in her sleep and mumbled urgently in his shoulder, sounding a big agitated. He slung his arm around her shoulder and kissed her on top of her soft, dark hair.

"Sssh, it's all right." He mumbled and Carla visibly relaxed in her sleep. His eyes shifted from the sleeping form of his wife to JD again and he squeezed his friend's cold, lifeless hand once more.

"You better pull through there, buddy."

---

Dr. Cox looked out into the sea of snow, whirling past in fierce spirals brought about by the icy wind. His forehead rested against the cold glass of the windowpane, bearing some comfort against the numb feeling his body felt. His fingers pressed the window, slowly increasing pressure as he watched in silent observation of the misty marks his body heat made against the icy glass. The hospital was misleadingly silent in the middle of the night. The storm was bad enough that paramedics were going to be hard pressed to get any new patients to the hospital. Indeed, someone would be crazy to venture out in the cold right now, in the middle of the night. The risk of snowing in were quite high and the changes of anybody finding them low.

He leaned back, rocking on his feet as he clasped his arms around each other. A low growl escaped his lips as annoyance flared up inside of him. He could be home right now, lying in his own bed with the she-devil. Granted, probably being woken up by Jack in the middle of the night because the boy wouldn't be able to sleep because of the howling of the wind and excited by the prospect of so much snow the following day. However, he would have preferred it to the smell and sight of this hospital. This living hell hole and place of death and misery.

But of course Clarice had to get herself shot and almost killed, paging _him_ of all people to come and rescue him. Another flare of annoyance swept through him when he thought about newbie's daydreams and that he probably would be the knight in shining armour while that girl imagined herself in a pink dress, braiding her hair and letting out terrific girly screams when danger drew near. That kid was going to be the death of him and he knew it.

He was also annoyed about the fact that he seemed to be unable to sleep. He had stood with the rest of newbie's gang in the recovery room when they had brought the kid out from surgery, had listened to the explanation of the surgeon. He had left after that, not wanting to look at that bed like some pathetic mother. Roaming the halls of the hospital, he had ended up in an on call room where he had tried to get some shut eye. However, the fragile figure lying there in the hospital bed kept popping up in his mind's eye. That was newbie. _His_ newbie.

God. That kid had finally gone and done it. He had gotten under his skin, infected him with his wimpy habits; he was turning into a girl. If he cared any more he might as well sit in that room and hold newbie's hand, sing lullabies for him, stroke his hair and tell him about the latest gossips in the hospital, even though he probably couldn't hear and understand any of it anyway.

He clenched and unclenched his fists and glared at the snowflakes as they were tossed about in the currents of the wind, swooping past the hospital in some kind of great, chaotic, dance routine. He kind of felt like a snowflake. Not the whole, beautifully unique and fragile snowflake, though. Good god, no. Maybe a borderline alcoholic, emotionally damaged, sharp, rough and pointy snowflake. Still; a snowflake, being tossed about in the turbulent currents of life's sadistic ways and showing him his existence was one big fucked up mess that he had no control over whatsoever.

A noise made him turn his back on the window and he glared at the one that had caused the disturbance. In the door opening stood the janitor, wheeling his portable bucket and mop inside the doctor's lounge, carelessly pushing it aside and flopping onto the couch. Dr. Cox narrowed his eyes at him.

"It's the middle of the night. What are you still doing here?"

The janitor looked up as if he only just noticed the doctor, he propped his foots upon the coffee table and leaned back, shrugging non-commitedly.

"A janitor never sleeps."

Dr. Cox gnawed his teeth, irritated by this uninvited presence in his silent safe haven. He just wanted to find some peace and quiet for a few hours.

"Why don't you go and mop something up then?" He bit back, bitterly.

"Nah. Did that, turned out it wasn't that much fun." The Janitor grabbed a errant magazine and opened it up onto a random page, then thought better of it and looked up.

"So, you gonna tell me what happened to Scooter?" He asked, sounding unconcerned. "Spider-monkeys finally got him? Told him not to use so much frizz gel. Those things are crazy for that stuff, can't stand the smell, you see. Attack you and bam! Next thing you know you're lying in a ditch somewhere, eyebrowless, just two fingers and a strange smell of coconut oil wafting from your clothing." He stuck up both of his index fingers and wiggled them up and down, indicating the two fingers one would still have left. Dr. Cox's annoyance flared in the presence of this seemingly random babbling, he rea-eally wasn't in the mood for the janitor's antics right now.

"Listen here, Mop-jock. You better stay away from him right now, because frankly if I find you anywhere near that room the next few days, planning out one of your sick jokes, I'm going to make sure you'll never look at a mop without fear and reverence again." He growled, glowering at the janitor, who frankly didn't look to impressed by the threat, and with that short burst of anger stormed out of the room again.

He seemed to be doing that a lot, storming away from people. Somehow, it made him feel good. And he really needed to feel good about something right now.

---

I approached the sea with some apprehension, looking out over the vast, still plane of water. It was like a liquid mirror, spread endlessly into the distance. The silence pressed heavily onto my eardrums, like pressure weighing down on my shoulders. I looked down and saw my face reflected upward, almost like a twin down under the surface looking up in my own startled face. I looked pale and ghostlike.

I kneeled down tentatively, my toes digging into the wet sand, and eyed the water curiously. Somehow it was an ominous presence in this dream, demanding attention while still appearing calm and unthreatening. I reached out with my hand and unhurriedly let my fingers loom over the surface, slowing as I drew nearer.

Gradually, my finger dipped into the ocean of black, the water almost reaching upward towards it, beckoning it to come closer. Cold wrapped itself around my finger, climbing up through my hand and chilling my arm. I drew my hand away from the surface, and a drop of dark liquid fell from my finger back into the water, disturbing it. Ripples pooled out from where I had touched it and spread across the vast mirror, continually multiplying into the expanse. I cocked my head and watched, feeling only a slight curiosity.

And there, faces stared up from under the cloudy water, turning to look at me. Some simply stared, others frowned, pouted, looked sad or angry. Yet, most smiled. My breathe hitched in my throat as a wave of emotion flashed over me while I recognized these people. Slowly, different memories stirred, awakened by my touch, flickering back to the surface of my consciousness, scenes being played out before my eyes on this grand cinematic screen. I knew these people. I sensed now the memories bubbling up from the real world. Not some gray dream where nothing stood as far as the eye could see. The memories stirred a feeling in me, leaving a sense of desolation as they passed.

Why was I in here and not out there? Why couldn't I leave this place and go back towards those people?

I stared into their faces, smiling, laughing and joking. Scenes unfolding over and over again, recollections of past events that filtered through my subconscious.

I felt suddenly cold and lonely. And afraid. Yes, fear came peeking over my shoulder, disturbing the water and clouding the faces. I wanted to leave. Go back there.

Go back to my friends.

Still, the gray sun shone pathetically down upon this gray world, illuminating nothing but my own sense of desperation while in the distance the rumbling of the thunderstorms drew closer.

* * *

TBC

Not a lot of dialogue in this one, I really just wanted to show everybody's feelings about the situation. Hope you still enjoyed it, though…


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